German Market Moderately Up

4/12/2012 6:52 AM ET

The German market is moderately higher in a choppy session on Thursday after Asian markets rose on encouraging remarks from the Federal Reserve's Beige Book. Sentiment was influenced by some broker commendations while banks gave up early gains after disappointing bond sale results came from Italy.

The Federal Reserve's Beige Book said Wednesday that the U.S. economic recovery proceeded at a modest pace in recent months, as manufacturers expressed optimism despite concerns about higher energy prices. Consumer spending was "encouraging" across a number of the Fed's twelve districts.

Meanwhile, the editorial to the European Central Bank's monthly bulletin showed that Eurozone inflation is expected to stay above 2 percent in 2012, with upside risks prevailing. Over the policy-relevant horizon, the ECB forecasts price developments to remain in line with price stability.

While a gradual economic recovery is expected in the course of the year, the outlook remains subject to downside risks, the bank said.

In economic news, industrial production in the euro area unexpectedly increased in February, helped by a marked increase in energy production, data released by statistical office Eurostat revealed. Industrial production moved up 0.5 percent on a monthly basis in February, after remaining flat in the previous month. Economists were looking for a 0.2 percent decrease.

In the U.S., futures point to a higher open on Wall Street. In the previous session, the markets benefited from a positive reaction to aluminum giant Alcoa's quarterly results. The Dow climbed 0.7 percent, the Nasdaq rose 0.8 percent and the S&P 500 advanced 0.7 percent.

In the commodity space, crude for May delivery is adding $0.51 to $103.21 per barrel and June gold is sliding $2.6 to $1657.7 a troy ounce.